[maria_bettina]

Hi! I am new to this forum (as of about 10 minutes ago ) and already have a question about the Theron Mag82 spotting scope.

We are headed to Yellowstone this summer and are in the market for a spotting scope. I read the reviews here on this forum and am thinking of purchasing a Theron Mag82. I want to buy as much spotting scope as we can afford and not have to "upgrade" later. Although a $1000 price tag is pretty steep for me, I can justify it in my mind if the spotting scope serves a dual purpose - terrestrial viewing AND star-gazing. My question is, Has anyone used this scope for stargazing? And how did it fare? (I guess I should also mention that stargazing is just a hobby, and it'll mostly be to introduce astronomy to my preschooler, and for us adults with a beer in hand on a nice evening.)

Thanks for any info!

[Steve C]

Originally Posted by maria_bettina

Hi! I am new to this forum (as of about 10 minutes ago ) and already have a question about the Theron Mag82 spotting scope.

We are headed to Yellowstone this summer and are in the market for a spotting scope. I read the reviews here on this forum and am thinking of purchasing a Theron Mag82. I want to buy as much spotting scope as we can afford and not have to "upgrade" later. Although a $1000 price tag is pretty steep for me, I can justify it in my mind if the spotting scope serves a dual purpose - terrestrial viewing AND star-gazing. My question is, Has anyone used this scope for stargazing? And how did it fare? (I guess I should also mention that stargazing is just a hobby, and it'll mostly be to introduce astronomy to my preschooler, and for us adults with a beer in hand on a nice evening.)

Thanks for any info!

I still have the review scope if its not single digits or raining buckets tonight I will give it a try. The nights lately when the stars were out it was too cold and besides I had a bad cold to boot. So anyway I'll try to gaze a few stars before I have to send it back,

[mooreorless]

Hi Maria, Welcome to Birdforum. Sorry I never used this spotter but you should be able to see the rings on Saturn with no problem and bands on Jupiter with moon shadow transits as well should be possible in good seeing. There are posts on Cloudy Nights about seeing Jupiter moon shadow transits at 60x with a 65mm Spotter. If you drink enough beer you might think you see where Armstrong walked on the Moon.

[maria_bettina]

Originally Posted by mooreorless

Hi Maria, Welcome to Birdforum. Sorry I never used this spotter but you should be able to see the rings on Saturn with no problem and bands on Jupiter with moon shadow transits as well should be possible in good seeing. There are posts on Cloudy Nights about seeing Jupiter moon shadow transits at 60x with a 65mm Spotter. If you drink enough beer you might think you see where Armstrong walked on the Moon.

Bah-hahahahahaha I didn't know you guys were so funny. If I had, I woulda joined years ago!

-----

And Thanks Steve C. I really appreciate it! I may pull the trigger (so to speak) tomorrow if you're able to gimme a thumbs up on the stargazing. The sale $949 will end soon at predatoroptics.com, so I wanna get in on the deal if at all possible.

[Steve C]

Maria,

Allow me to correct my manners and bid you welcome to BF. Somebody someplace around here can likely answer most any question you can ask. Heck, some of them might even be right!

OK. There's a hole in the clouds and Jupiter was clearly visible just now. The only problem is there is a pretty strong wind as it is blowing in a storm front. That made it very difficult to get more than sporadic spits and stutters where it would die down a bit to quit making the scope dance. It was fairly calm as I got the scope set up, found the planet, got it centered and focused at 25x, but then Murphy turned loose his law and the wind picked up.

What Steve (moreorless) said is about right. The scope I have focuses quite sharply, all the way to 75x. The unfocused "round net bag of electrons" shrinks gradually away into a nice pinpoint image. There seems to be minimal to no diffraction spikes. At least as near as I could tell all the way to 75x as the bounce was pretty bad much above 40x, then it was bad enough. Yes, banding could be seen at 60x (or maybe guessed at), but even in the "steady" moments I could not begin to say anything about moon shadow transits. Banding was not clearly visible much below that tonight. However the moons show up nicely down to 25x. Sometimes there was 4 moons sometimes 40! The 30x WA is nice if 30x is enough. Lots easier to find what your are looking for with more fov. Edge performance holds up nicely until the very last part of the edge. Be sure to get a good , solid tripod with a good, easily manuverable head. You should be happy enough with it I think. That's kind of sketchy, but it won't get any better tonight as I can hear the wind picking up as I type this. Maybe if I took Steve's suggestion and drank enough beer the shaking would not have seemed so bad.

I would have unboxed the Kowa and ZEN if conditions were better.

EDIT: Well the wind died down just now and I tried this again. Yes, the banding starts to show up fairly decently at somewhere over 50x. It is pretty distinct at 75x. I'm not astronomer enough to know how many Jovian moons show up at what magnifications, but there are more than four. Still shaky enough that its is hard to tell if some of what might be a moon is maybe a star. So again, you should happy enough with this.

[maria_bettina]

Originally Posted by Steve C

Maria,

Allow me to correct my manners and bid you welcome to BF. Somebody someplace around here can likely answer most any question you can ask. Heck, some of them might even be right!

OK. There's a hole in the clouds and Jupiter was clearly visible just now. The only problem is there is a pretty strong wind as it is blowing in a storm front. That made it very difficult to get more than sporadic spits and stutters where it would die down a bit to quit making the scope dance. It was fairly calm as I got the scope set up, found the planet, got it centered and focused at 25x, but then Murphy turned loose his law and the wind picked up.

What Steve (moreorless) said is about right. The scope I have focuses quite sharply, all the way to 75x. The unfocused "round net bag of electrons" shrinks gradually away into a nice pinpoint image. There seems to be minimal to no diffraction spikes. At least as near as I could tell all the way to 75x as the bounce was pretty bad much above 40x, then it was bad enough. Yes, banding could be seen at 60x (or maybe guessed at), but even in the "steady" moments I could not begin to say anything about moon shadow transits. Banding was not clearly visible much below that tonight. However the moons show up nicely down to 25x. Sometimes there was 4 moons sometimes 40! The 30x WA is nice if 30x is enough. Lots easier to find what your are looking for with more fov. Edge performance holds up nicely until the very last part of the edge. Be sure to get a good tripod. You should be happy enough with it I think. That's kind of sketchy, but it won't get any better tonight as I can hear the wind picking up as I type this. Maybe if I took Steve's suggestion and drank enough beer the shaking would not have seemed so bad.

I would have unboxed the Kowa and ZEN if conditions were better.

Yeehaw! And I want to thank you, but I think I'll be $1150 poorer this evening (I'm buying the Theron Wapiti 10X42 HQ binos, too) and I'm blaming you...sigh...

Thank you! And thanks Mooreorless for your input!

Edit: Well Steve, I'm glad your edit did not say, "Just kidding, this scope sucks!" Because I just bought 'em. Can't wait to try the spotting scope out (and the bins for that matter). I hope the postal service delivers fast; the weather here is looking fantastic for the next week.

[Steve C]

Originally Posted by maria_bettina

Edit: Well Steve, I'm glad your edit did not say, "Just kidding, this scope sucks!" Because I just bought 'em. Can't wait to try the spotting scope out (and the bins for that matter). I hope the postal service delivers fast; the weather here is looking fantastic for the next week.

Naw, I'd never do that. Now I hope what you see does not tell you I'm full of hot air! If you don't have a tripod, a good tripod with a good head, you need to get poorer! I'm looking so don't have a good recommendation yet.

[maria_bettina]

Originally Posted by Steve C

Naw, I'd never do that. Now I hope what you see does not tell you I'm full of hot air! If you don't have a tripod, a good tripod with a good head, you need to get poorer! I'm looking so don't have a good recommendation yet.

I'll be interested in your tripod reviews. I do have one, though is it a good one? Dunno. I've only owned the one ever. It's flippin' heavy, and I have issue with the ease of moving my SLR around on it. But for now, it'll have to do. We'll see if the new spotting scope and the tripod I have get along.

[Steve C]

Hey I'm a long way from even thinking about a tripod review. But thanks for the sentiment. I really hope you enjoy your optics. Have fun.

[mooreorless]

Hi Maria, "It's flippin' heavy" Your tripod could be ok to use for this. Any brand name on it and the head?

Originally Posted by maria_bettina

I'll be interested in your tripod reviews. I do have one, though is it a good one? Dunno. I've only owned the one ever. It's flippin' heavy, and I have issue with the ease of moving my SLR around on it. But for now, it'll have to do. We'll see if the new spotting scope and the tripod I have get along.